Removing Customizations from PCB Files in PowerPoint 2013

Learn how to remove customizations from PowerPoint's PCB files in PowerPoint 2013.

Author:Geetesh Bajaj

Product/Version: Microsoft PowerPoint 2013OS: Windows 7 and higher

Date Created: November 9, 2015Last Updated: November 9, 2015

PowerPoint add-ins help in adding new capabilities that can polish your presentation in many ways. But when the time comes to uninstall
these add-ins for whatsoever reason, you might be surprised to find their menu customizations still exist! Click those menu extensions and
nothing may happen -- but these menu options are still there! In another scenario, you may have customized your PowerPoint menus and toolbars to a
large extent -- and may now want to restore everything to a pristine state -- almost like how the interface looked when you first installed
PowerPoint.

In either case, it is possible to lose all these customizations. The key to this solution lies in PCB files. So what's a PCB file? Let's learn
more.

A PCB file is a PowerPoint Settings file where PowerPoint stores every customization you make within the program interface -- this includes
moving toolbars, the appearance of new add-in menus and toolbars, customizing presentations, etc.

Whenever PowerPoint 2013 launches, it looks for this PCB file within a typical location
in Windows 7 and 8:

C:\Users\<UserName>\AppData\Roaming\Microsoft\PowerPoint

If no PCB file is found, PowerPoint creates a new one! In other words, PowerPoint restores all default. Therefore, this creation of a new PCB
file can be put to advantage. So to counter this issue, we need to rename or delete the errant PCB file:

Make sure PowerPoint 2013 is closed. Then navigate to the path mentioned
below:

C:\Users\<UserName>\AppData\Roaming\Microsoft\PowerPoint

Substitute <UserName> with the user name set for your computer.

Within this folder, you will find at least one PCB file, as shown in Figure 1 below. If you see more than one PCB file here, that means you have multiple versions of Microsoft Office installed on your system. Refer to Figure 1, again and you will see that we have another
file called PPT14.pcb. If you also have this file, please leave that untouched since that pertains to
PowerPoint 2010, an older version. The file you need for PowerPoint 2013 will be named
PPT15.pcb or similar.

Figure 1: PCB file location

Now you can either delete the PCB file or you can rename it with a .bak or another extension. We highly recommend that you
rename rather than delete the file! For this example we will rename the file with a .bak extension, as shown in
Figure 2 below. You can also always delete the PCB file later once a new PCB is created, and everything seems to be working well

Figure 2: PCB file renamed

Tip: Always keep a back up copy of your PCB file -- this may come handy when you want to roll back PowerPoint's customizations
to an earlier stage.

Note: Don't try this process while PowerPoint is still open.

Now launch PowerPoint 2013. It might take a while to load since a new PCB file is being created. At this point of time, get back to the
original folder that contained the PCB file -- you'll notice that a new PCB file has been created.

Have your ever used keyboard shortcuts and sequences in PowerPoint? Or are you a complete keyboard aficionado?
Do you want to learn about some new shortcuts? Or do you want to know if your favorite keyboard shortcuts are documented?